I'm kind of in NuclearWookiee's position... battery dice sound like a prefigured coordination dice. Which works for me, really. It solves the problem elegantly, and within the existing rules. If it's not a perfect match for coordination dice, there's room to fudge on either side and call it acceptable; the only real problem would be if the battery dice were freakishly high._________________"I’m telling you, you’ll never have a deeper sleep than curled up in a Wookie’s lap."
“We're going to win this war, not by fighting what we hate, but saving what we love.”
http://rpgcrank.blogspot.com/

Me too. In fact, treating a fighter squadron as a "battery" gives a +3D-4D Battery Rating, which would put it on par with Frigate-Scale ships in my scale system. It also opens up some interesting possibilities as far as squadron defense. What I mean is, if you are treating a starfighter squadron as a single unit for capital ship combat, that squadron can shift its formation for defensive purposes, with the Battery Dice being applied either to Shields (flying in close formation to optimize shield overlap for defense) or to Maneuverability to represent a loose, dispersed formation in which the individual units are dispersed as to be harder to hit._________________"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.
Amazing. Everything you just said was wrong.

I use a similar setup. I base my "battery dice" total on the coordination table from 2d ed. and round down. So for an ISD, 20 turbolasers in one arc would be 5d battery dice; for an MC80, 12 turbolasers in one arc would be 4d battery dice.

If I have to pick a RAW Coordination method, I prefer the 2E version. However, it isn't flawless, which I discuss here. Using the x2 = +1D method generates a similar return at low levels, sloping up as the number coordinated increases, but does so in a consistent pattern which the 2E method lacks.

Quote:

But the way I handle the coordination bonus is a little different. The coordination bonus always applies to the to-hit roll when firing the battery. For every 5 points that the roll exceeds the target difficulty, 1d gets added to the damage roll. But this bonus gets capped at the coordination bonus.

I use the RoE Optional Damage rule for accuracy increasing damage, specifically, the 3/1 method. As far as Battery Dice, I'm probably going to stick with allowing it to be applied to Fire Control, Damage, or MAP reduction. I'm also chewing on using the Battery Dice as the basis for Barrage-Pattern firing against smaller targets like starfighters._________________"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.
Amazing. Everything you just said was wrong.

I'm kind of in NuclearWookiee's position... battery dice sound like a prefigured coordination dice. Which works for me, really. It solves the problem elegantly, and within the existing rules. If it's not a perfect match for coordination dice, there's room to fudge on either side and call it acceptable; the only real problem would be if the battery dice were freakishly high.

Under the currently proposed method, the highest Battery Dice on any ship would be on the SSD and similar ships, in the 6D-9D range. There is also the Death Star, but we don't really need to go there; the only ships where high-level Battery Dice numbers will come into play are going to be exceptionally rare._________________"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.
Amazing. Everything you just said was wrong.

Using the x2 = +1D method generates a similar return at low levels, sloping up as the number coordinated increases, but does so in a consistent pattern which the 2E method lacks.

Shockingly I'm in total agreement.
I like that I don't need a lookup table since there is a simple formula. And I like that that the curve flattens out. And frankly the mathiness of using power/logs appeals to me.

1). I used the stats as published by WEG for conversion, even though I don't use those stats myself.

2). Rather than using a straight round-up or round-down, I used a ~30/70 split to decide down or up.

_________________"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.
Amazing. Everything you just said was wrong.

In the past, we've discussed different ways of allowing massed battery fire to saturate an area that smaller-scale ships are flying through. The method I most liked for doing this is the treating the affected area as hazardous terrain. Where I got hung up was how to apply a ship's weapons against the terrain difficulty.

Here's my thought...

1). Roll the ship's Battery Dice + Fire Control against the base Difficulty for that Range.

2). If the Battery Dice roll beats the Base Difficulty, apply the difference to the base Difficulty for whatever the local terrain in.

3). Any ship passing through the area must make a Piloting roll against the modified Difficulty, and suffer Mishaps as appropriate.

4). Calculate damage as normal for Collisions, but for game purposes, the damage is caused by the battery fire.

_________________"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.
Amazing. Everything you just said was wrong.

I think an example or three would be helpful to get a sense of whether this hits the right degree of difficulty and danger or not.

I'll see if I can throw up some examples if I have some downtime tomorrow._________________"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.
Amazing. Everything you just said was wrong.

I think an example or three would be helpful to get a sense of whether this hits the right degree of difficulty and danger or not.

Okay, so, the scenario is, an ISD has detected an incoming squadron of starfighters. As things stand, the ISD has no real anti-starfighter defenses apart from its own TIEs, so for the sake of this example, the ISD opens fire with its turbolaser batteries.

Initially, the attacking fighters are at Long Range, so the ISD rolls its combined Fire Control and Battery Dice (4D+5D=9D) against the base Difficulty for that range (Difficult / 20), and gets a 23 (per my dice roller app). 23 beats the basic Difficulty by 3 points, so then 3 is added to the terrain Difficulty for the starfighters (assume a base of Very Easy/5, so 8).

Next round, the starfighters have closed to Medium Range (Moderate/15), and the ISD has fired its turbolasers in barrage mode again. This time, the combined roll gets a 36, beating the Range Difficulty by 21. The base Terrain Difficulty for the starfighters is still Very Easy/5, but now the Difficulty jumps to 26 (5+21), and what was once Very Easy Terrain is now in the Very Difficult range.

The starfighters have to beat the Terrain Difficulty to continue to close with the ISD, and any failures result in Movement Mishaps, where every Collision result is a near miss with a turbolaser blast (or a complete vaporization on a really bad roll).

Is that sufficient?_________________"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.
Amazing. Everything you just said was wrong.

Last edited by CRMcNeill on Sat Sep 09, 2017 6:55 pm; edited 1 time in total

I'm just spit-balling some numbers for this, so the combined dice values could also be subject to Scale and Crew Skill, as well. Factoring in both the Scale Difference (-6D) and the Crew Skill (4D) would have the ISD rolling 7D instead of 9D in the above example.

In fact, I prefer it with the additional modifiers, as it allows ships with better gunners to improve the effectiveness of the barrage pattern._________________"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.
Amazing. Everything you just said was wrong.

Thanks CR! Very helpful. I'd want to run more examples before trying it out, but what you have seems workable and headed in the right direction to me.

Quote:

The starfighters have to beat the Terrain Difficulty to continue to close with the ISD, and any failures result in Movement Mishaps, where every Collision result is a near miss with a turbolaser blast (or a complete vaporization on a really bad roll).

It makes sense (and I like) that terrain difficulty means that nimble ships with low hull/shields (A-wing) have the advantage over less nimble ships with heavy hull/shields (Y-wing) to make the terrain difficulty. But if they fail...ouch!

I want damage results in between near miss and complete vaporization. I should like to see a situation where a tough ship like a Y-wing or X-wing could take a few light hits on the way in if the terrain difficulty is missed by not too high a number. But that should be possible with the correct chart for what a mishap means for various degrees of failure.

CRMcNeill wrote:

In fact, I prefer it with the additional modifiers, as it allows ships with better gunners to improve the effectiveness of the barrage pattern.

I want damage results in between near miss and complete vaporization. I should like to see a situation where a tough ship like a Y-wing or X-wing could take a few light hits on the way in if the terrain difficulty is missed by not too high a number. But that should be possible with the correct chart for what a mishap means for various degrees of failure.

The Movement Rules list different base damages based on how fast the ship is traveling. Maybe we can reapply those damage values to the top 4 results from the Movement chart, so a Spin inflicts 2D damage, a Minor Collision 4D, a Collision 6D and a Major Collision 10D._________________"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.
Amazing. Everything you just said was wrong.

The Movement Rules list different base damages based on how fast the ship is traveling. Maybe we can reapply those damage values to the top 4 results from the Movement chart, so a Spin inflicts 2D damage, a Minor Collision 4D, a Collision 6D and a Major Collision 10D.

An X or Y wing will be fine (almost always) with a 2D result. Should usually be fine or at most get some shield damage with a 4D result. Will take a bit of damage from 6D and for 10D the ship is (almost always) destroyed. In which case any PC pilots better have GI-Joe style ejection seats.

Looking at a A-wing everything effectively shifts one category more serious while the Millenium falcon is one or two shifts less serious...which explains why it can fly at an ISD all by itself.

At the risk of reopening an older post, I had a question about how this might apply in a specific situation. Say a Victory Star Destroyer is attacked by a Nebulon B, a Corvette, and several fighter Squadrons. The rebels obviously want to split up.. so with one ship in the front arc, one in the side arc, and fighters to the rear, how do you determine which battery dice you can use to overcome MAP using this system?_________________"The universe is driven by the complex interaction between three ingredients: matter, energy, and enlightened self-interest."
G'Kar, Survivors (Babylon 5)